Video games can provide any number of ways for a person to relax, unwind, chill out and, if for only a little while, escape to somewhere else. And the desire to find this feeling has manifested itself in many ways and wildly different offerings. Some find that escapism in epic fantasy RPGs, some in blockbuster action, others in cozy farming sims or visual novels. But an emerging subsection in recent years has been that of tiny, sandbox diorama builders. Games that might resemble something like a city builder or simulator, but are closer to the real-life act of scale model building.
Games like Tiny Glade, Summerhouse and Townscaper have shown that there’s value in shrinking the idea down to its barest essence, and giving players an intentionally-constrained set of tools to get creative with. An approachable surface to work on, a manageable set of tools and no tasks or urgency to get between you and making something lab-tested to be beautiful every time.
Midnight Moments joins these games in their quest to provide constructive zen, but ditches the sunny, idyllic aesthetic for a rain-slicked, neon-lit cyberpunk setting – not unlike 2024’s Dystopika. Where that game had you zoomed out to city scale, though, Midnight Moments is far more snug, giving players just a 10×10 grid to work with and props scaled to suit no more than a street corner or couple of small buildings. It’s in the name, but the direction here leans more toward building moments than monuments, which makes it feel distinct from a lot of its peers.
This was my first go, building off of the starter model
Hopefully the cyberpunk moments you’re interested in crafting happen strictly at night, and in wet weather, because that’s another important restriction here. Though you have some control over the amount and direction of ambient light, and can increase or decrease the effect of pouring rain, it will always be night and any walls you erect will always be wet.
I learned this the hard way when I decided to try my hand at making a classic cyberpunk nightclub complete with an upper level dancefloor above a well-stocked bar. It actually turned out fairly well, I think. As much fun as I have, I always struggle to make anything unique or interesting in these types of games, but this is probably one of the few times I felt I had a handle on what I was building. The only trouble is the water constantly running down all of the walls on the inside of my club – I do think that may be something of a hazard.
Elsewhere though, the small amount of flexibility in the selection of placeable objects had me coming with satisfyingly ingenious solutions. I turned a fenced balcony piece into a DJ table and then placed some sideways air-conditioning units to look like decks. I turned windows on their sides to make slick-looking glass doorways, industrial wall fans became speakers, and so on.
Two different views of my club model, showing the kind of scale you can work with for screenshots
There is some finagling involved in breaking out of the rigid block structure, I spent a good deal of time “tricking” the game by placing cubes to create lines, then attaching objects or building off of those lines and then deleting the cubes. Some more granular grid-based placement could be helpful, but it’s these kinds of creative solutions and workarounds that limitations tend to inspire.
It’s surprising how much you can get out of a pretty meagre selection of walls, floors, adornments, objects and simple human models, though there will inevitably be a point where you want just a little more. Developer Happy Volcano has hinted at additional bits being added if Midnight Moments feels popular, but I would probably argue that doing so betrays a core value.
What I would like to see are some improvements to the UX, including an undo/redo function and the ability to select specific variants of applicable objects (like humans) without just placing them over and over again until the one you want appears. And aside from the wetness factor, indoor environments are also made more difficult by not being able to peer through or cull from view any walls you’ve built.
An official screenshot, showing what’s possible in the hands of someone talented
Bottom line is you’ll get out of Midnight Moments exactly as much as your own imagination or desire to craft tiny stories out of a very curated selection of objects allows. It does help that it ships with an example build that you can start from, if a blank canvas is too confronting, and it also all looks and sounds lovely enough that just sitting on a nice model and soaking in the vibe is valuable on its own. The game makes good use of Unreal Engine 5 technologies like Lumen lighting and reflections to sell the look, and to pave the way for some beautiful screenshots and clips (not mine, but definitely someone’s).
I can’t quite decide whether or not I believe that injecting a little more substance into Midnight Moments would make it appreciably “better,” aside from the few UX shortfalls that would undoubtedly benefit from adjustments. But in the right hands, the right mood, at the right time, it’s easy to lose hours carefully arranging folks in front of their blocky buildings, watching the rain pour down and thinking about what kinds of stories are being told in this tiny slice of cyberpunk life.
Reviewed on PC | Review copy supplied by publisher
Great
- A great wind-down tool that inspires imagination and storytelling
- Rain and neon-slicked cyberpunk night aesthetic is lovely
- Small area and curated, crafted tools encourage focus
- Uses UE5 technologies like Lumen to great effect
Not great
- Lack of an "indoor" setting means walls are always wet
- No wall view culling also prevents making enclosed spaces
- A few basic controls are missing
Born into the world of video games through SEGA, and in particular Sonic the Hedgehog, Kieron’s gaming tastes now consist of the latest, shiny AAA thing, an indie darling or two, and an embarrassing number of hours of Balatro.